


In the Wake of a Pulse

by habenaria_radiata



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, Bittersweet, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route, First Kiss, Fluff, Missing Scene, Pre-Time Skip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-12
Updated: 2019-08-12
Packaged: 2020-08-20 01:10:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20219308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/habenaria_radiata/pseuds/habenaria_radiata
Summary: In the aftermath of loss, Byleth feels little more than a ghost whose only haunt has burned to ash. Fortunately, there are still those she can turn to, even in times of grief.Spoilers for Blue Lions (Pre-Timeskip Pegasus Moon)Part 1 of 3Part 2:A Silence that ChokesPart 3:And Stillness that Threatens to Drown





	In the Wake of a Pulse

**Author's Note:**

> I took a break from non-stop Three Houses playthroughs to write this for some much-needed catharsis. A big thank you to [Cinereous](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cinereous/profile), [KelpieChaos](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KelpieChaos/profile), and [Decay](https://archiveofourown.org/users/decay/profile) for beta reading this for me! I hope you enjoy. ♥

* * *

They say ghosts are a lingering manifestation of past regrets or injustices. Creatures denied a satisfactory death and left to a hostile world where they were only to be exorcised from their fragile existence, whispered about by sadistic teachers to keep their students in line, or denied entirely. They could do nothing but relive the worst moments of their lives, tormented in perpetuity while happy memories were forever beyond their grasp.  
  
The first and only time she'd ever been asked what she was, that was the word that leapt from the tip of her tongue. Ghost. Even now, months after the fact, Byleth wasn't certain what compelled her to say it. Sothis had hardly been amused, and she couldn't claim to have said it with any amount of earnesty. But she'd never really thought about it before then. Having to define her place in the world, whether that be _of_ it or beyond it, wasn't something she'd ever prepared herself to do.  
  
She had thought about it now. If someone were to ask her again, she might even answer the exact same way, with a little more conviction. Byleth could imagine the sight she'd made roaming the halls to get here, the edges of a black jacket unfurling from around her, billowing with each stride, a shroud for the specter of her blank white face. It seemed like a missed opportunity that none of her darling students were up and about past curfew. She wasn't above putting the fear of god in some rule breakers by lending credence to the many rumors of church ghosts with a fondness for naughty night owls.  
  
But there was no one. The fog of her breath was, perhaps ironically, the only sign of life in the upper chambers of the monastery. A heavy silence blanketed the captain's quarters as thickly as the snow frosting the roof above, and it was so quiet that she could hear nothing but the biting snap of burning wicks licking at the air.  
  
The solace of silence had been her excuse for coming here, but now that she had ensconced herself within it, it only left her uneasy. Perhaps she’d believed that if she could find a quiet thick enough, she might be able to hear the sound of Sothis’ voice again. Instead, the intensity of it made the accompanying silence in her own head feel all the more oppressive.  
  
The faint creak of metal hinges set her spine in a rigid line. Byleth's fingers gripped tighter at the scabbard in her palm, her other hand curling around the hilt and sliding it free one smooth, silent inch. "Professor?" In a split second, the tension disappeared. She slipped the sword back into place and let go, swiveling quietly there on the desk. The entryway was swallowed by darkness. What flickering light the paltry number of candles afforded couldn't quite reach as far as the door, but it hardly mattered. Byleth recognized that voice better than most. She listened as the door slid shut once more, and soft footsteps approached her where she sat upon the corner of the desk.  
  
Dimitri fell still half-way between the door and herself. She watched him stand there, his face both illuminated by candlelight and shadowed in equal measure. Finally, she tilted further toward him and laid the sword across the desk. "It's past curfew, Dimitri."  
  
"Er, yes," he agreed. He faltered a moment, but if she thought that he would respond by turning and fleeing, she soon found herself mistaken. Rather, Dimitri squared his shoulders and bowed to her, one hand pressed flat to the front of his chest. "I am prepared to accept whatever punishment you deem appropriate."  
  
Byleth snorted. Her gaze lingered on him a moment more before she gestured with her head, nodding him further inside. He accepted the tacit offer. Dimitri followed her beckoning motion, stepping up beside the desk and just before the stained glass window that reached up towards the high ceiling. Outside, the pegasus moon was so bright that the multicolored gem shapes took on an ethereal glow. Try as it might, however, even its brilliance could not pierce the moody darkness of the captain’s office, nor slice through the glass to touch his skin. Dimitri paid it no mind. He was looking right back at her, a soft furrow etched between his eyebrows.  
  
She shifted on the desk corner and gave into an internal wince as pinpricks of discomfort flooded down both her legs. "What are you doing here?"  
  
To his credit, he didn't hesitate, ever the earnest young man. "I was looking for you. Are you...alright?"  
  
Her first instinct was to say yes. To extend an entreaty that he not worry about her; he was her student, and she was the allegedly-responsible adult entrusted with his growth and care. It was absurd that he should be wandering the halls late at night to check on her. She wanted to remind him that he had far more important things with which to concern himself than the well-being of a teacher. But instead, she said nothing at all. She wasn't any more certain that she was alright than she was certain that she wasn't. She just..._was_.  
  
On one hand, her father was dead, but on the other, she'd exacted vengeance only one moon later. She could turn back the hands of time, but only when it suited someone else’s narrative. She'd merged with some form of goddess and literally transformed to be better, stronger, and more supernatural -- but she liked her old hair better. In the end, nothing existed to tip the scales in one direction or the other. She drifted through the days in a state of suspended animation, a pair of perfectly balanced plates without a fulcrum.  
  
As her silence stretched on, Dimitri hesitated, then sat down in the small wooden chair before her and pressed his fingertips into the curves of his knees. "Professor." She blinked and looked up at him again, noting the way his eyes flickered as he took in the sight of her unearthly irises. "This might be inappropriate -- and if it is, then I beg your forgiveness -- but I'm here if you'd like to talk."  
  
Byleth didn't doubt that. In the aftermath of her father's death, he'd been the first to offer his hand. She knew that if she had faltered, Dimitri would be the one to help her pick up her sword and drive it forward. She tilted backwards, numbness buzzing beneath her skin where she'd sat for too long. "Alright," she said. "I'd like that."  
  
The room might be dim, but the smile that tugged at his mouth lit up Dimitri's whole face. It soon dropped away however, a curled fist pressing to his lips as he cleared his throat and settled into a more serious expression. "How are you feeling? You explained to me what happened at the Sealed Forest, but I admit, I'm still not certain what all it entailed. Do you feel different?"  
  
"No."  
  
Dimitri seemed so surprised by her blunt response that it amused her. She could see the question in his face, but she wasn't persuaded to change her answer. She had all the same abilities before Sothis dissolved in her arms; now she could just do them better. Maybe there were newer, stronger powers sloshing around against the edges of her insides, but she did not feel _different_ any more than a chalice could feel that water was different from wine.  
  
"I...see." For all that Dimitri was uncertain how to respond to that, he recovered well. "Then, if not physically, how about the rest? We were able to strike down Jeralt's enemies. Do you feel satisfied?"  
  
What a question. Unlike the first, it was also one for which Byleth had no immediate answer. Was she satisfied? She could hardly say. That was among the things she'd come here to wonder about in the first place.  
  
Slowly, she tilted further back on the desk and swung her legs, clenching her calves and curling her toes against the soles of her boots to stir sensation back into them. Apparently she'd been contemplating that for longer than she'd realized. "I don't know," she said finally, opting for honesty.  
  
Poor Dimitri. She wasn't making this very easy for him. He'd tracked her down through an empty monastery only to have her make him work to earn every measly one-to-three-word response she deigned to give him. He lapsed into silence himself, in fact, his brows pinching tighter. But as his eyes fell to the surface of the desk, he reached out towards it and then stopped, his hand hovering near her thigh. "May I?"  
  
She nodded and reached behind her, sliding the sheathed sword forward until he could lift it from the wooden surface. He was more ginger with it than any non-decorative sword had need of, but Byleth was charmed by him, watching as he slid it from its sheath and inspected the iron blade that shone beneath the candlelight.  
  
"You used this in the battle," he noted. It wasn't a question, so she didn't bother to nod. No doubt he had expected her to use the Sword of the Creator to vanquish the unholy spawn that robbed her of her only family. To heft up the blade of the goddess herself and bring it down in divine judgment.  
  
But she hadn't. Byleth inclined her head towards the sword and laid her hand over his, gently turning his wrist until the pummel faced up towards the ceiling. "My father gave this to me. It seemed more fitting." An ordinary iron sword had indirectly destroyed Kronya, and, a lot more directly, destroyed Solon. She liked it because it _wasn't_ a poetic ending. They died at the hands of the mundane they so loathed, a literal insult to injury.  
  
Was she satisfied? Byleth still had no answer for that. She'd hurt Kronya, had sent her running into what would ultimately be her doom by someone else's hand. It should be enough that she was dead at all.  
  
And yet.  
  
A slow frown built over her face like storm clouds choking the horizon. Her hand gripped harder, still wrapped around Dimitri's fingers where they curled around the sheath of her oldest sword. "Suppose you are a fish," she said, so sharply that Dimitri sat back in the chair, his blue eyes wide but unflinching.  
  
"Suppose," she said again, quieter now, "that you are a fish. And suppose that the one you love most in all the sea is killed by a shark. You may be just a fish, but you're driven to punish this shark who hurt you. Who destroyed your family. Now suppose that when you come face to face with this shark, it’s devoured by a whale right before your very eyes."  
  
Dimitri stayed perfectly silent. He made no attempt to brush away her hand, no matter how tightly she gripped at his own. Byleth stared back into his eyes and clenched her teeth. "If it were you...could you be satisfied with the taste of whale instead?"  
  
Only then did Dimitri move, his fingers shifting beneath her own. "No. I don't suppose I could."  
  
She let go of his hand. Of course he couldn't. He understood. Better than anyone. No, that wasn't even accurate to say -- _she_ had only just begun to understand Dimitri. She had lost her father, had the means to fix it, and failed. Four years ago, Dimitri had lost everything in one horrifying sweep, no more capable of stopping it than he was of guarding against a lightning strike from the heavens. Byleth knew that trying to quantify their suffering was a race straight to the bottom, but the thought did nothing to ease the tidal wave of guilt that threatened to drown her.  
  
Byleth slid off the edge of the desk, planting herself on both feet and gazing down at him, her eyes lingering where a lock of his hair brushed at his eyelashes. "If someone were to ask you what you were, what would you say to them?"  
  
"What I am?" Uncertainty flickered across his smooth face. He looked as though he wasn’t entirely sure she had no intention to grade him on his response. "I would say that I am a prince."  
  
She might have guessed that would be his answer. His first thought was to his relationship with the people of his holy kingdom. He was their prince, beholden to a populace that had venerated his ancestors. "And if you were to be asked by something not of this world?"  
  
If he was growing fatigued of her bizarre questions, Dimitri was doing a good job obfuscating the fact. His face drew into a thoughtful look, one thumb coming up to sweep along the curve of his chin. "Then I would say that I am a man."  
  
Not a ghost. Not a demon of vengeance. Just a man. One who accepted that existing and being sensate was enough to consider himself alive. And why wouldn't he? He was no more dead than she was, but unlike her, he chose to act like it. While she shambled lifelessly around the monastery, circling this empty office like a locus, Dimitri lived his life: studying, training, attending school dances, and throwing himself headlong into battles, stubbornly fighting on behalf of others while he was denied even a sliver of closure.  
  
Something she'd never felt before bubbled up in her stomach. It was cold and unpleasant and stung at her cheeks more harshly than the sun under the Garland Moon. Shame. She was....ashamed.  
  
Before it could swallow her whole, Dimitri was on his feet as well, and he coaxed the sword back into her hands. "And you, Professor? What would you say?"  
  
She jerked to awareness, her fingers closing around the sheath. The icy air from the window had leached into it, leaving it cold everywhere save for where Dimitri had touched. For a moment longer, she remained silent, clutching the sword so tightly her knuckles began to protest. When she lifted her head again, Byleth squared her shoulders. "I would say that I'm a professor."  
  
"A professor?"  
  
Mutely, Byleth nodded. She turned away from him and set the sword down, laying it across the empty desk with a gentle click of metal on wood. Though she wasn't facing him any longer, Dimitri was not to be deterred. She could hear the shift of his feet beneath him as he spoke again.  
  
"Is that your answer because I'm of this world?"  
  
A rush of breath left her, as close to a peal of laughter as any of her students had heard from her in the eleven odd months they'd spent together. "Maybe," she agreed. When she swung back around, Dimitri was smiling.  
  
"Then what would you say if I were not?"  
  
Perhaps she'd been wrong earlier. It was foolish to retreat behind the curtain of unlife before death had even come to claim her. Worse, it was cowardly. The other professors needed her. Two instructors couldn't teach three houses. Her students needed her. They had kingdoms and empires and alliances to serve, and they'd be walking the paths she'd guided them down. Dimitri needed her. He'd been at her side, helping her to destroy her father's murderers. The least she owed him was to help him in his quest for answers.  
  
No dictionary she'd ever seen defined 'life' as a heartbeat.  
  
Besides, no one expected the dead to draft curriculums. Byleth looked back at him, tilting her head and pressing a curled fist to her jaw. "Then I would say that I am a woman."  
  
"A woman...I dare say you are." Byleth cocked her head sharply, a smile twitching across her lips as Dimitri's eyes grew wide in the face of his own audacity. "I- I simply mean to say that you are an extraordinary woman. I hope you know that I am grateful every day that you chose us as your house."  
  
It was impossible to see whether or not he was blushing beneath the orange glow of the candles, but it was clear in the wavering of his voice and the tripping of his tongue. She remained politely silent as he stammered, edging backwards toward the door and clearing his throat once more.  
  
"I apologize. I should return to my quarters. It is hardly my place to make demands of you, but I believe some rest would benefit us both."  
  
Awkwardly, Dimitri bowed again, a hand flat to his sternum. She wondered how it would feel for his heart to beat beneath her palm. "I dare say you're right," she said, her voice perfectly mild. If he caught onto her deadpan teasing, Dimitri declined to indicate as much. He simply slid backwards a step, the tension in his shoulders relaxing, and he lead the way towards the door where he would undoubtedly open it for her like the gentleman he was.  
  
"Dimitri."  
  
He stopped immediately, pivoting on the heel of his boot to face her once more. Byleth's eyes roved across him, carefully taking stock of the shadows beneath his eyes and the faint slouch of his spine. Alert though he was, he was obviously tired. It would be dawn in only a handful of hours, and here he was wasting his precious nights, freely offering his time and compassion and understanding and perhaps a hint of inappropriate appreciation.  
  
"Thank you," she murmured. "I'm glad you came to see me."  
  
A bright smile, warm and life-giving as the sun, seized him. "Of course. I'm glad I did as well. It's good to see you feeling better. We all care for you a great deal." As she'd expected, Dimitri opened the door for her, one hand gripping the handle and the other arm sweeping towards the hall. Byleth did not step through it, however. She stood there in the doorway, unmoving until she pressed it shut with the sharp, decisive click of a latch. Dimitri released the handle with a start. "Professor?"  
  
The temptation to feel it beneath her fingers was too much to bear. She stepped forward, close into his space, her palm pressing flat to his chest and steering him back against the wall until his shoulders touched it. His heart fluttered against her skin, a dove caged within the bars of her fingers. The steady throb of it was oddly comforting. Did he feel it all the time? Or was it so rhythmic and everpresent that it existed beneath his notice?  
  
Despite the cold of the room, warmth bled into her palm, seeping through the thin material of his shirt.  
  
"Profe-"  
  
Byleth swallowed the last syllable. She closed her mouth against Dimitri's own, her hand still spread wide across his sternum. Her lips lingered only a precious few seconds before she pulled away, but it was enough they buzzed with sensation -- and enough that Dimitri froze in shock.  
  
He did not stay that way for long. His entire body unthawed at once, loosening and surging forward to chase her mouth. One of his hands slid downward to grip at her hip, the other coming up beneath her hair and hovering there, as though he was afraid to go so far as to touch her neck. Eventually, he seemed to summon whatever courage he needed. His fingertips slid along the back of it, trailing fire along her skin, as delicate and unsure as the way his lips touched against her own.  
  
She was the first to pull away. Her chest blazed with something indescribable. Byleth swallowed and closed her eyes, her forehead resting against Dimitri's. The feather-light brush of his pale bangs against her skin was desperately endearing to her.  
  
As they stood there, their breathing returning to normal, silence rushed in with such a vengeance as if to punish them for breaking it at all. Dimitri still grasped her to his chest, his tight hold that of someone who wasn’t confident that this wasn’t a dream. Maybe it was. Or, if it wasn’t, then maybe it would have to be.  
  
Byleth closed her eyes and swept her fingers along the front of his shirt, her nails catching along the complicated design of his uniform.  
  
"I'm sorry, Dimitri."  
  
Before he could ask why, the world pulsed around her. Its colors inverted harshly as it spun, her chest crushing forward into Dimitri's, his hand flying from the back of her neck and then away, their bodies drawing widely apart and flowing backwards along with the steps of time.  
  
When she stopped, Byleth squeezed her eyes shut, having to reorient herself as she always did when time reconstructed itself around her. Her eyes opened again, and she could hear Dimitri's voice filter back to her. "-some rest would benefit us both."  
  
"Yes. I agree."  
  
She squeezed her hand into a tight fist and shook herself back to attention. Oblivious, Dimitri retraced the exact same steps as before, opening the door for her with an identical sweep of his arm. This time, Byleth did step through it, swinging on one ankle and facing him. "Thank you. I'm glad you came to see me."  
  
Again, he smiled for her, so sweet and earnest it made her chest squeeze itself. "Of course. I'm glad I did as well. It's good to see you feeling better. I c-" Dimitri paused there, his hand drawing closed at his chest before he dropped it at his side. "...We all care for you a great deal. Good night, Professor."  
  
"Good night, Dimitri."  
  
They parted ways at the stairs, Byleth trudging down them one at a time, a wave of exhaustion sweeping over her all at once.  
  
She could still feel the smooth, even tempo of a pulse burning against the palm of her hand.

**Author's Note:**

> **Edit**: Wow! Thank you all so much for the warm reception! Your feedback means the world to me, and all your comments have been such a treat to read. If a sequel or companion piece is something you guys are interested in, please feel free to let me know. I'll link it here in the future if it happens!
> 
> ♥ Radi
> 
> **Edit 2**: [sequel delivery](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20288995). Ask and ye shall receive, my friends.****


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